Surrey man pleads guilty to defrauding international students

A Surrey man has pleaded guilty to defrauding international students from India with fake college acceptance letters.

In October, the federal government said it was investigating more than 2,000 cases where international students, who engaged travel agents and consultants to help them navigate Canada’s student visa system, were unwittingly given fake acceptance letters.

The governement said last year Brijesh Mishra of Surrey was one of the main culprits.

In June, Mishra was arrested in Surrey facing five separate charges under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act — four of which stemmed from the Punjab region of India and one from Canada.

His lawyer, Gagan Nahal, told CityNews that Mishra pleaded guilty to three of the five charges in court Wednesday.

The court accepted a three-year prison sentence on top of the nearly 12 months Mishra had already been held in custody.

Nahal said he expects Mishra to be granted parole in a month, after which he will face inadmissability and deportation.

“His legal issues are concluded in Canada, in terms of the charges he was facing, but we did provide documents to the court where he’s facing a minimum of seven separate charges — six of them under the Indian Penal Code, which is equivalent to a Canadian criminal code. And one of them is under the Punjab job travel act. And there are warrants issued for his arrest back in India. So if he is deported and the moment he landed, he’s likely to be arrested right away and his legal proceeding in India will begin,” said Nahal.

He doesn’t know how Mishra intends to plead in Indian criminal courts.

Nahal said he feels for the victims, and Mishra appears to share in that sentiment.

“He didn’t deny or minimize his role. He’s content to remain in custody and the fact that he did plead — not to all accounts, but most of them — demonstrated that he is remorseful.”